Involuntary vs. voluntary flexible work: insights for scholars and stakeholders

ABSTRACT

Building on insights from the early stages of our research partnership with a U.S. Fortune 500 organization, we came to differentiate between voluntary and involuntary schedule variability and remote work. This differentiation underscores the complexity behind flexible schedules and remote work, especially among white-collar, salaried professionals. We collected survey data among the partner firm's information technology (IT) workforce to evaluate whether these forms of flexibility had different implications for workers, as part of the larger Work, Family, and Health Network Study. We find that a significant minority of these employees report working variable schedules and working at home involuntarily. Involuntary variable schedules are associated with greater work-to-family conflict, stress, burnout, turnover intentions, and lower job satisfaction in models that adjust for personal characteristics, job, work hours, family demands, and other factors. Voluntary remote work, in contrast, is protective and more common in this professional sample. Employees working at least 20% of their hours at home and reporting moderate or high choice over where they work have lower stress and intentions to leave the firm. These findings point to the importance of both stakeholders and scholars distinguishing between voluntary and involuntary forms of flexibility, even in a relatively advantaged workforce.

RESUMEN

Edificando sobre la base de conocimientos que resultaron de las fases iniciales de nuestra colaboración con una empresa estadounidense de la Fortune 500, hemos diferenciado entre el trabajo a distancia o variabilidad de horario voluntaria e involuntaria. Esta diferenciación destaca la complejidad tras los horarios flexibles y el trabajo a distancia, particularmente para oficinistas y profesionales asalariados. Como parte del estudio más amplio ‘Work, Family, and Health Network Study’, lanzamos una encuesta a los empleados especializados en las tecnologías de la información (TI) de esta empresa, con fines de evaluar si dichas formas de flexibilidad laboral tienen distintas implicaciones para los funcionarios de esta empresa. Se observa que una minoría importante de los empleados declara haber experimentado variabilidad de horarios y haber trabajado desde casa de forma involuntaria. Se observa que la variabilidad de horario involuntaria se asocia con mayores incidencias de conflicto entre trabajo y familia, estrés, agotamiento, intenciones de rotación laboral, y otros factores. En cambio, el trabajo a distancia voluntario protege a los empleados y es más frecuente entre esta muestra de profesionales. Aquellos funcionarios que realizan 20% o más de sus horas laborales desde casa y que declaran tener moderadas o amplias opciones de empleador presentan menos estrés y menores intenciones de renunciar. Estas conclusiones demuestran la importancia para académicos e interesados de distinguir entre la flexibilidad laboral voluntaria e involuntaria, incluso en una fuerza laboral relativamente aventajada.

KEYWORDS:

• Workplace flexibility
• flexible work arrangements
• schedule control
• remote work
• telecommuting
• translational research

PALABRAS CLAVE:

• Control de horarios
• flexibilidad laboral
• trabajo remoto
• traslacional
• Investigación
• acuerdos de trabajo flexibles
• teletrabajo

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Employees may ‘bundle’ their flexible work practices (e.g. work voluntarily at home but report an involuntary variable schedule if their job involves some late-night calls). The impact of various configurations of flexible work practices should be examined in future research but we do not have the sample size to address that here.

2 We use categorical indicators because of potential collinearity with firm tenure.

3 The same pattern is seen when we consider those who do substantial remote work; employees with voluntary variable schedules are overrepresented among voluntary remote workers. There are no significant differences between the schedules reported by those doing substantial involuntary remote work and those doing less remote work, nor between those with involuntary variable schedules and those with stable schedules.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health: [Grant Number U010H008788, U01HD059773]; Alfred P. Sloan Foundation: [Grant Number (Moen)]; Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development: [Grant Number U01HD051217, U01HD051218, U01HD051256, U01HD051276]; National Institute on Aging: [Grant Number U01AG027669].

Notes on contributors

Anne Kaduk

Anne Kaduk received her Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Minnesota and then worked as a research analyst in the technology industry.

Katie Genadek

Katie Genadek is a research associate at the Institute for Behavioral Science at the University of Colorado - Boulder and an economist with the U.S. Census Bureau.

Erin L. Kelly

Erin L. Kelly is the Sloan Distinguished Professor of Work and Organization Studies at the MIT Sloan School of Management and an affiliate of the Institute for Work and Employment Research at MIT.

Phyllis Moen

Phyllis Moen is the McKnight Presidential Chair in Sociology at the University of Minnesota and directs the Life Course Center there.